Topic: Exit: Passing between worlds (Read 21940 times)

Holey Moley · « **Reply #15 on:** May 02, 2022, 02:34:16 AM »

Patch

http://csv.swordofmoonlight.net/SomEx.dll/1.2.3.6.zip

This patch fixes some (serious) problems with SOM_MAP's new Convert system. I'm glad I held back on giving this round a work a new release label, since it's still very much in progress. I used it late yesterday to prepare this (https://swordofmoonlight.itch.io/k/devlog/375925/april-2022-demo-announcement) new demo. It seems that was the first time it had been tested.

I also just fixed the magic spell icon in the Arrange Inventory screen, I'd recently broken while ripping out some code to do with the MENU/map_icon.bmp feature.

For the record, the prior patch also fixed a new screen initialization bug when opening save files from Windows Explorer.

This patch also has a fix for the three button fast-running feature that had erroneously popped up the shield when taking damage. Damage could come from falling or normal damage sources.

P.S. Publishing that demo marks the end of a period of more intense work for myself. I'm going to try to take things easy for a little while and see what happens. It's good to let your mind drift from time to time to not miss the forest for the trees in life. I think I mean to pick up the COLLADA-DOM project I've been off and on with over the years. I want to do something completely different, and that's something I've been neglecting too long. I mainly just want to build it with the CLANG compiler and see if the major compilers are getting any better at compiling C++ templates. (Microsoft's is way ahead of the pack in this area, but still I believe it could/should be much, much better.)

Holey Moley · « **Reply #16 on:** May 07, 2022, 01:36:00 AM »

EDITED: Just for whom it concerns I think I've decided what I want to do next is to take some time to add some nonlinear animation and animation curve fitting facilities to the MM3D model editor. This is something that's been weighing on me for a while, and I still need to update some of the animated models to shave 1 frame worth of time off the end of their run-times, so if I do this project first I can also rebuild their animations with real keyframes (currently they have a keyframe for every frame that makes any movement, which you can't realistically make edits to) so that that can be rolled into the same SVN Update. I.e. "2 birds 1 stone" (the 1 frame of extra time thing doesn't really impact the existing animations that much, so it can wait a little while longer.)

I also don't like how the shield/weapon animations I made for my demo move, and I think nonlinearity will help that and help me to simplify these new animations. Chances are the original kit that was used to develop SOM's models had nonlinear animation facility, but I won't know for certain until I can analyze their data.

I'm also going to be fussing around with VR for a while, off and on. I have a new Nvidia video card that should allow me to resume my work on that front.

P.P.S. I did some of that work on COLLADA-DOM yesterday (Reply #15) and it hit another blocker for CLANG, so I may put it back down for a while. I also had a horrible time with Microsoft's Remote Desktop because it just doesn't want to work to let my new PC connect to my old PC over my local network. Windows seems to be developing unaddressed bugs these days, like it's sliding backward into its old reputation of being an endlessly frustrating experience. For me it feels awful to spend the afternoon banging my head against an impenetrable problem. And I hate that I can't reliably access my old PC easily.

Incidentally this COLLADA project is my best reference for nonlinear animation. My main job will be to adapt its code (a lot of it written myself) to the MM3D system and figure out a suitable UI for it. For the record, I don't intend to add nonlinear animation facilities to SOM. The "hard" animations have data for every frame, so they can approximate a nonlinear animation with a high number of samples. The "soft" animations can't do this, so they would require new data in the MDL format. The real blocker however is Assimp's model representation, which can't represent nonlinear data. So for now this will be limited to the hard animations. I'll have to be rid of Assimp to progress beyond this, another day.

EDITED: Also, some might like to know that KF2 uses "soft" animation for everything, however many if not most of its animations don't really require this, and I feel they'd be improved to be converted into "hard" animations. It's one of my goals to do this. So far I've had to do it for the arm model for technical reasons. And I've done it for a number of "objects", like the drawbridges and doors for example. It just makes them more manageable. I'd guess the original art files were not animated this way but were converted so the game could use a consistent animation system. Although some of KF2 animations (like treasures chests and some doors) are accomplished more like how SOM's events are able to move objects. In that case there's usually multiple objects, like the lids on its treasure chests are their own objects (as is their lower, box half) for example.

Holey Moley · « **Reply #17 on:** May 29, 2022, 01:34:54 PM »

SVN Update

I've updated the hard animation type MM3D models to remove the last frame and remove redundant key frames. The latter point is nice because it makes it practical to edit the animations or reuse them as a starting point for making new or customized models.

I had to leave most of the SFX models alone apart from the final frame because they weren't coming out right. Probably because they turn a full 360 degrees. I have to look into it but I'm burnt out on this for now. I couldn't bring myself to go through and check every animation for correctness, and I know there are still some redundant key frames in there that could probably be verified/removed manually. I figure if there are any problems (I saw none) they'll just have to be stumbled over over time as usual.

In order to do this I had to recalculate the lighting surface normals, and I'm not sure what the MM3D software generates is an improvement. It has to use its normals if the file is saved. If it had occurred to me before I'd done most of the data entry I may have had set up a new "utility" that could have preserved the original normals. But I don't think it's that big of deal, and really the models need manual work to add smoothing groups to them. Low-poly models are hard to use any kind of automatic normal generation system with. I'd even like to add facilities for hand tweaking normals, to make this editor a beast for low-poly work.

The MM3D software is becoming pretty mature. I've been sitting on what would be a new release for a while. I also found a bug in x2mdl.exe for making MM3D files that overwrites existing textures with a 1x1 image. I have to publish a patch ASAP but I don't believe anyone is using it for this. Mostly this is for converting SOM's proprietary file formats into MM3D files.

Holey Moley · « **Reply #18 on:** August 24, 2022, 03:14:27 AM »

Patch (SOM_MAP)

http://csv.swordofmoonlight.net/SomEx.dll/1.2.3.6.zip

This fixes a problem with the Add button in SOM_MAP when adding monsters and NPCs on a fresh screen. I put in some new stringent error handling code fairly recently that "returned" the wrong value (0 instead of -1) and also the X and Y rotation fields needed to be initialized to 0 to pass this error checking for better or worse.

Note, this patch has the VR code for my current KF2 demo, but it doesn't have code for the normal HP gauge and compass. The KF2 demo uses an alternative HUD that's like the PlayStation trilogy's. So I still have to work on those. When I finish them there will be a new release, and it will change the default Ex.ini file to use the new OpenGL mode that the demo uses.

EDITED: Thanks to JackTheRipper for spotting this.

Holey Moley · « **Reply #19 on:** August 24, 2022, 11:23:54 PM »

SVN Update

http://csv.swordofmoonlight.net/Exselector.dll/0.0.0.2.zip
http://svn.swordofmoonlight.net/Sword-of-Moonlight/tool/Exselector.csv

I've added an updater file so Exselector.dll will be downloaded and used if triggered. I'll probably add a backup copy of this DLL in the next release.

P.S. I'm not sure what I'm doing with myself right now. I know I have to get back on the horse. I'm thinking that I need to finish the non-KF2 style onscreen display elements and make that a new release, and then I'm thinking I should probably work on switching the DATA/MAP folder over to using the new art system. That requires a project to add a feature to x2mdl.dll to tessellate split-level tiles in a way that works for the do_aa extension. Choosing what to work on next is always a bit unnerving. It takes a little time for intuition to kick into gear.

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Exit: Passing between worlds

Author Topic: Exit: Passing between worlds (Read 21940 times)

Holey Moley

Holey Moley says,

Holey Moley

Holey Moley says,

Holey Moley

Holey Moley says,

Holey Moley

Holey Moley says,

Holey Moley

Holey Moley says,

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Sword of Moonlight| Devs| Exit: Passing between worlds

Author Topic: Exit: Passing between worlds (Read 21940 times)

Sword of Moonlight|

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Exit: Passing between worlds